I have tried many apps. They just do not have all the options that x.ai does. Some have better APIs, like Acuity, but the interface for booking is a bit lackluster and the price for the features is just not there for me.
Doodle is great when you need to coordinate dates among a group and don't want to send a bunch of group emails or texts. It allows a number of dates to be proposed and the group can easily see those dates that are most preferred. If you need to do something more complex than that it may not be your tool.
I think any business can benefit from Acuity Scheduling. In my experience, however, and maybe I just haven’t found the correct settings yet, it’s been difficult to manage 4 business schedules with multiple employees and varying hours that change day-to-day and week-to-week. So I definitely would recommend it to more simple business models with set hours, as it seems like it would have all the functions one might need. I still would recommend to more complex businesses like mine as well, but also include discussion of some of the potential drawbacks.
X.ai is very well suited for a departmental type use where Amy has access to everyone's calendar. It is a requirement that people keep their calendars up to date and live by them. Otherwise Amy might think that you are free when you have a flight booked or are on vacation. She is extremely good for those times when a prospect agrees to talk to you at a conference. I just send them a quick email, cc Amy and tell her to set up a call, and it magically shows up on my calendar!
Doodle allows you to view multiple meeting times simultaneously. I may never have 100% of my team available, but I can see that I have three other options with 90% availability.
Doodle is a free resource that doesn't require users to create an account or exist in a network. I simply send the link and see the responses.
Doodle notifies you as people respond, making the scheduling process quick and easy. Also, you can confirm a time through the software!
Clicking on the link opens up my calendar, which has an uncluttered look, making it easy for my prospects and clients to review their options and make their choice.
I am able to customize my schedule, the types of appointments I want to offer, and even decide how many appointments I want in a day. There are so many details that I can customize.
I can customize how my calendar and emails look for my prospects and clients so that I come across professional and coordinated. I want the look of my business, website, etc. to have a polished, cohesive, and interesting presence.
I love that there is a workshop/class/series option for my workshops. My attendees reserve their place and pay upfront. I can duplicate these events or add future dates. It's wonderful. This saves us a lot of time and is so convenient.
I haven't had any trouble with my scheduler. It works flawlessly, so I don't have to take time out of my day to fix, troubleshoot or call customer service.
I love that I can add questions for my prospects to answer right away before booking a call. This means 3 fewer steps for me. 1. They answer these questions without an email from me. 2. They make their reservation and get a follow-up email, right away. 3. I customized the follow-up email with more details and actions to take to prepare for our call.
x.ai makes it easy to initiate, schedule, and manage meetings with internal and external constituents. Especially in the case of internal constituents, scheduling is almost instantaneous on the team plan because the AI can see the available/busy schedules for anyone in our G Suite domain and schedule meetings based on my preferences and the other person's availability.
The calendar function makes it easy for me to share a limited calendar with others so that they can automatically schedule a meeting with me without having to go back and forth.
The customer service team at x.ai is stellar. They are kind, quick to respond, and typically resolve cases on the first try. They are also incredibly receptive to feedback and new ideas that often get incorporated into the product.
I wish that it offered more options in backgrounds, characters and props without having an additional cost, but that is to be expected.
I would like an easier way to add my own fonts, characters , props etc, because I am a new learner this may not be an issue as I get more familiar with the software.
I don't like all the sales emails I received trying to upgrade or add to my purchase.
One person mentioned that the zoom link isn't easy to open from the calendar appointment
Some people have been confused by using the names "Amy" or "Andrew", not realizing these are AI bots. So, I now use the "X.ai scheduler" to avoid confusion
Acuity Scheduling has been very reliable. If you don't believe me, check out their status page here. They do a pretty decent job maintaining their app. To be fair, it's a pretty simple tool so they shouldn't run into too many hiccups given it doesn't feature near as many options as other applications on the market run.
It is very easy to use once you get to know the program but with years of working with the program I am still finding new things that I had wished I knew about earlier. I feel like aspects of the website become hidden that would help productivity a lot if I knew they existed beforehand.
Doodle has customer service support available as needed, but honestly, it is so easy to use that I have rarely had to seek support. They are always a click away and responsive to resolving any need or to clarify the next best step to using Doodle to meet my needs.
Every time I had a question on how to do something or had any issues with Acuity Scheduling, mainly in the very beginning, when I was learning the platform, customer service was excellent. They were prompt to respond, friendly, and very helpful until I had the right solution.
For the same reasons noted previously, Doodle allows for the organizer to ultimately select/accept the time that works for them. Many competitors only allow you to show available times and the appointment goes directly into the organizer's calendar. I typically prefer to have a bit more control over that. Also, visually Doodle is more intuitive in how you schedule appointments than Calendly. I think Calendly tries to get a bit too cute with their interface instead of sticking to a more standard, familiar calendar interface when setting an appointment.
In the case of Schedulicity, the system was awesome (very easy to set up and had some nice features) but did not offer the functionality and flexibility that AcuityScheduling does. In the case of SimplyBook.me, they offer lots of functionality but the interface is extremely complex and you pay a la carte for features so you're going to pay exponentially more for the same set of features as compared to AcuityScheduling. Their customer service was also lacking, in my opinion.
Heard about Claralabs AI assistant from friends using this service. But I found x.ai to be suited for my requirements. Claralabs is also good but when it comes to pricing and ROI, x.ai is better.
Improved efficiency by avoiding the slow and inefficient process of emailing back and forth to set meeting dates and times.
Allows for more informed decisions regarding meetings or making decisions, as all options can be laid out visually in a way that isn't possible in an email.
